


The Fallibility of Memory

by Emjen_Enla



Series: Prompted Works [25]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: (ish the implications are creepy), Angst, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Gen, Ghost Physics, Insomnia, Late Night Conversations, Memories, Pre-The Raven Boys, Psychological Horror, but then Noah took over the show, mini henrietta, this was meant to be a Gansey-centric fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-17 11:34:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20620355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emjen_Enla/pseuds/Emjen_Enla
Summary: Gansey and Noah talk about how they met. This is not the first time they've had this conversation. Originally written for Gansey Week day four "Memories," but turned out to be a fic about Noah, not Gansey.





	The Fallibility of Memory

**Author's Note:**

> I meant to post this fic weeks ago, but kept forgetting, so here it finally is. Hilariously, I'm not the only person writing for this character week who also had Noah run away on them and take control of a fic.
> 
> I'm still (ill-advisedly, given how much I have to do) taking prompts on my writing Tumblr @emjenwrites.

“Noah, how long have you been living here?”

Noah tensed and turned around. Gansey was sitting on the floor of Monmouth Manufacturing, surrounded by his mini Henrietta. He was dressed in pajamas and his wire-framed glasses were perched on the bridge of his nose, somewhat disguising the rings of sleeplessness under his eyes. He was frowning at Noah with the slightly mystified look of someone who had just realized something very odd that they couldn’t believe they’d never noticed before. 

Gansey had just noticed something very odd. It wasn’t, however, the first time he’d noticed it, though he never seemed to remember the other times after the fact. Noah could never decide if that was a curse or a blessing. 

“I’ve always been here,” Noah said. “I was murdered by my best friend and now I’ll haunt you into infinity.”

Gansey took Noah’s comment as a joke and laughed. Noah said stuff like that all the time. Though he’d never admit it--even to himself--he hoped that someday they would make the connection and realize that he was being serious, but they never did. He was never sure if that was because he interacted normally with them all the time and therefore didn’t seem dead, or if something about the fact he was a ghost made them overlook it. 

After a minute, Gansey sobered. “But I mean it, Noah: when did you move in?”

“You can’t tell me?” Noah asked, though he already knew the answer; they had had this conversation before.

“No…” Gansey admitted, his face twisting as he wracked his brain. “I can’t remember it at all. When did I ask you? When did we bring your stuff in? Where did we meet?”

“If you can’t remember, then it mustn’t be too important,” Noah said. There was no way to tell a Gansey who thought Noah Czerny was a living person that Noah had simply appeared in the Monmouth one day and whatever ghost physics governed his existence had kept Gansey from questioning it. To Gansey it felt like Noah had always been there. Within minutes the urgency of the realization that he couldn’t remember meeting Noah would fade and within the day he’d have forgotten all about it. 

The memories of living people were so malleable; Noah couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized that while he was alive.

“Of course, it’s important,” Gansey said, at least for the moment indignant. “You’re my friend; it’s incredibly rude of me not to remember how we met. It makes me seem like I don’t care about you.”

“Come on, Gansey,” Noah joked in an attempt to lighten the mood. “We both know that you’re actually worried that you can’t remember whether or not you’re supposed to be charging me rent.”

Gansey’s eyes went almost comically huge with horror. “No, Noah! That’s not what I meant at all! I’m not only letting you live here because I want money. The same holds true for Ronan. I-“

“Relax, Gansey, I know,” Noah said. “I was just kidding.”

“Oh,” Gansey relaxed. “I still mean it, though.”

“I know,” Noah said. Ronan technically did pay Gansey rent, but that was because Declan transferred money to Gansey’s account every month regardless of Gansey’s protests. It drove Gansey mad with frustration and guilt, but Noah found the implication that Declan thought Gansey would abandon Ronan if not paid sad. 

“It doesn’t matter how we met, Gansey,” Noah went on before Gansey could sink deeper into shame. “We know each other now and that’s what matters.”

Was it really what mattered, though? By this time tomorrow Gansey would have forgotten all about this conversation and the oddity of the fact he couldn’t remember meeting Noah. He might even forget it by tomorrow morning if he managed to overcome his insomnia and sleep. He would go on treating Noah like a normal friend until the next time his inquisitive mind overcame Noah’s ghost-ness enough to remember that something wasn’t right. Then they’d have this same conversation again.

Sometimes, when things got really hard, Noah thought about telling Gansey. Of course, he told Gansey all the time, but he meant really telling him in a way that Gansey would believe. He knew that if told properly, Gansey would believe. Gansey believed In Glendower; he would believe in Noah too. There was really no reason for Noah not to tell him, except that he was afraid of what would happen. He knew Gansey would accept that he was a ghost, but he was ashamed to admit how he’d come into the other boy’s life. How could he look Gansey in the face and admit that he had just shown up one day and his magic had made Gansey accept him and assume he’d been invited in? The thought was horrifying. 

Of course, Noah was a being who lived on a spiral. He knew that eventually Gansey and his friends would know what he really was; he’d been far enough forward to see that. He knew that they didn’t disown him once they found out, but he couldn’t help worrying about why. Maybe the same thing that kept Gansey from remembering that he had never asked Noah to move into Monmouth would keep them from getting angry about it. Perhaps they had no choice but to accept Noah.

The thought terrified Noah. He didn’t think of himself as a terrible, haunting ghost like the ones which had graced the horror movies he and Whelk had watched before everything had gone to shit, but maybe he was. Maybe he was managing to be a monster without even meaning to be.

“Is something wrong, Noah?” Gansey asked, his face pinched with worry. “I shouldn’t have brought it up, but...I didn’t want you to think more of me than you should.”

“No, I’m glad you asked,” Noah said, ignoring the last statement. He never knew what to do when Gansey’s unexpected lack of self-esteem started showing. Besides, he was always glad when Gansey remembered to question Noah’s presence. Maybe one day it would actually stick. “But you really should get some sleep. It’s late, and there’s school tomorrow.”

“In a minute,” Gansey said. “I just want to finish this house.” He spoke in a light way that suggested that while his insomnia was acting up, it could have been a lot worse which was good. Noah lived on a spiral; he had memories of Gansey in the future, working on Henrietta with shaking fingers and distracted eyes. He knew how bad things were going to get less than a year from now when Gansey knew that he was going to die again and was struggling to find Glendower and make things right before that. Noah remembered but he couldn’t figure out how to make things better for his friend. Maybe there was nothing he could do.

Sometimes he questioned what he’d been thinking telling ten-year-old Gansey that he’d been saved by Glendower. Perhaps he would have been better off saying nothing at all. Maybe that would have been for the best. Gansey would never have come to Henrietta, would never have met Ronan or Adam or--soon--Blue, but maybe he would have been happier.

Noah knew that wasn’t true, but sometimes he wondered about it anyway.

“I’ll stay awake until you’re done,” Noah told Gansey. It was the least he could do.


End file.
